Chapter 74: Ghouls!
Currently, the trio were traveling across a rough trail through scattered trees, overgrown plants all around them, with moss also visible everywhere.
Albedo was riding Ember slowly with a relaxed posture. The Solaris Mare moved with deliberate grace, each of her flame-hooved steps echoing like smothered thunder across the dying light.
Ember was holding back her usual speed, pacing herself to match the two walking beside them.
Celeste was walking silently, with an unreadable expression as she just walked and kept her head down, while Lilian was practically dancing as she moved, humming under her breath while twirling a charm between her fingers.
"You’ve been awfully quiet back there," Lilian said without turning, glancing at Albedo over her shoulder, "Don’t tell me you’re mad we tricked you."
"You didn’t trick me," Albedo replied. His voice was calm, almost disinterested, "You just lost."
Celeste smirked faintly at that, though she didn’t comment.
"Fair. Still, it’s impressive. There’s no-one in our yeargroup back home even close to us, it seems the Humans are entering a golden era." Lilian said with a grin.
Albedo didn’t answer initially, the trio walking silently for quite a while before eventually, he asked, "You said the route was through the Snide Darkness Forest?"
"Yup," Lilian replied, twirling the charm again, this time revealing it clearly. A violet medallion with silver edges, pulsing gently with necrotic nullification magic, "It’s northwest from here. About a day’s journey, assuming we don’t stop too much."
"And what makes that forest so special?" Albedo asked, watching the edges of her expression carefully.
He was in foreign territory here, so he wasn’t as knowledgable compared to the Human Kingdom which was thoroughly explored in the Novel.
Celeste answered this time, her tone crisp, "It’s infested with Ghouls."
"Thousands," Lilian added helpfully, "But these charms make us invisible to them. Celeste’s father had them made years ago after an expedition into the deeper rings of the forest. They project a thin null-zone that masks all life signatures within five meters."
Albedo arched an eyebrow, "You just happen to carry anti-ghoul wards everywhere you go?"
Lilian shot him a playful smirk, "We don’t go on strolls in flower fields, you know. Most places worth visiting want to kill you."
"And the teleportation zone?"
Celeste cut in again, "Deep within the forest’s heart. Buried in a ruin. It’s not a standard spell-circle, it’s an ancient gate linked to various noble paths through the Demon Kingdom. Only those of high bloodlines or recognized tokens can activate it."
"So we’re using your family crests to get through?" Albedo guessed.
Celeste nodded. "I carry my sigil. Lilian carries hers. If we sync it with your mana signature via the Veyth, it should allow passage. Though it might sting a little."
Albedo gave a short nod, processing the information, "Fine. It sounds efficient."
A brief pause once again came in the conversation, before he finally asked the question he’d been thinking about since they woke.
"What are you two even doing outside the Kingdom? Shouldn’t you be at the Demonic Academy?"
He asked. Each of the Races had their own Academies, and every two years, there would be the Grand Inter-Academy Tournament.
The next one would be next year, but Celeste and Lilian didn’t appear, most likely because they just didn’t want to or had early graduated for some reason.
Celeste didn’t answer. She kept walking, her tail flicking once. Lilian, however, laughed.
"Oh, sweet little prodigy," she said with theatrical flair, "You’re not wrong. It is Academy season. The semester started a few weeks ago."
"And you’re here. Skipping."
"Yes," she confirmed without an ounce of shame, "Because we’re bored."
Albedo blinked and raised an eyebrow.
"Let me guess," he said slowly, "You’re both at the top of your year."
Lilian gave a mock bow.,"Thank you for your research. That’s right. Celeste and I are... what’s the term they use for humans? Honor students? Model students? Those. Except instead of reading dusty tomes, we’re out here in the field getting stronger."
Celeste finally spoke, "The Academy isn’t built for us. It’s too slow. The instructors are scared of pushing royal-blooded students too hard, afraid of offending someone’s mother or uncle."
She sounded bitter about it as she spoke.
Albedo understood that frustration well. It certainly would be frustrating never able to challenge advanced topics out of the teacher’s fear of offending anyone. It could eventually become suffocating.
"Can’t you get training from the Headmistress? What’s her name Zaleria Everstar?" Albedo asked, remembering the Elven Headmistress of the Demonic Academy from the Novel.
"She’s too lazy to teach anyone, instead she just allows us to go out and explore since that’ll improve our strength faster. Actually, most high Nobles do this, we aren’t that special."
"So you explore," Albedo said. "You wander, fight monsters, dig up ruins, and chase after strange phenomena."
"Exactly," Lilian said, "We’ve been delving in forbidden tombs, and we even fought a blighted drake with nothing but pocket sand and Celeste’s rage issues,"
"It wasn’t blighted," Celeste said dryly, glaring daggers at Lilian for daring to bring that incident up.
"It was corrupted. You said so yourself." Lilian said with a smile, dashing to the left as Celeste tried to grab her by the hair, barely evading it.
"I said it was malformed." Celeste angrily said.
"Same thing!" Lilian responded.
Albedo watched them bicker for a few seconds, then looked ahead toward the dark, looming tree line of the northwest.
The horizon was beginning to shift as Albedo could see shadows pooling deeper, the trees growing more gnarled and twisted, with a faint, oily mist began to creep across the trail they were walking on.
The Snide Darkness was near.
Lilian’s voice dropped slightly, more serious now, "Once we enter, don’t stray more than a few steps from us. The null-charm zones are fragile, and if you fall outside, the ghouls will sense you."
"And they hunt in packs," Celeste added, "Some of them don’t even die when you break their heads. Especially the older ones. Some used to be Knights or Warlocks."
Albedo reached forward, gently brushing Ember’s mane again.
"I’ll stay close."
He responded, thinking for a second before he looked back down at the pair with a smirk on his face.
"You two may be trouble, but I’d rather not have to drag your corpses to the Demon Gates."
Lilian raised an eyebrow, "You’d do that for us? How noble."
Albedo met her gaze, eyes cold.
"No. I’d do it because I need the passage. You dying would be... inconvenient."
Celeste smirked, "He’s got Demon in him after all."
They continued forward in silence for a moment longer, the light waning.
Albedo looked up at the mist-cloaked woods that now towered ahead. Branches like claws sticked out everywhere.
And as the first steps into the cursed forest began, the charm around Lilian’s neck pulsed, and the world grew quieter, as the Ghouls began to appear.
The mist grew denser and denser as they walked deeper and deeper, and they saw more and more Ghouls arriving slowly.
Shapes emerging from the fog. Figures slouching between the roots of trees or dragging themselves across the soil.
Some crawled like demonic fiends while others staggered upright, others moved on all fours like malformed beasts that had forgotten what it meant to walk as men.
They were grotesque parodies of life.
One wore the remnants of rusted armor, clearly once a soldier, his breastplate half-caved in, black ichor dripping from the hole.
Another had her hair in matted, muddy clumps, lips torn away to reveal exposed teeth permanently locked in a breathless, gnawing grin.
Others were naked, their skin shriveled like dried leaves, stretched tightly over disjointed bones that cracked with every twitching step.
Their eyes, or what remained, glowed faintly, without intelligence but with endless aching hunger.
And they were everywhere. Hundreds, if not thousands, drifting between the trees like forgotten memories.
Their movements were slow but constant. A steady procession of decay.
From where he rode atop Ember, Albedo could hear them, their groans were not just vocal. It was a wet, sickly sound, as if their lungs were filled with rot.
Occasionally, one would emit a sharp clicking noise, like broken glass scraping against stone.
Celeste walked just ahead of him, one hand resting lightly on the hilt of her curved dagger while Lilian hummed a faint tune, her charm flickering.
The null-zone extended outward like an invisible bubble, five meters in every direction. Within that radius, the three of them, plus Ember, were nothing.
Voiceless, scentless, unseen. As far as the ghouls were concerned, they didn’t exist.
And yet...
They came close.
One ghoul dragged its dislocated shoulder within inches of Lilian’s robes, its head twitching violently to the side as if trying to hear something that wasn’t quite there. Its nose twitched.
Its tongue, long, blackened, forked, slithered out of its lips and tasted the air.
Lilian didn’t flinch, as if she had experienced this many times before. She simply stepped aside.
Another ghoul, this one crawling, paused directly beneath Ember’s hooves. Its spine was partially exposed, a glistening mess of nerves twitching with erratic jolts.
The Solaris Mare froze completely, even her ethereal mane dimming to a mere glow. Her muscles tensed, but not in fear, in restraint.
Albedo stroked her neck gently as she continued walking. The ghoul paused, head tilted upward... and then continued on its crawl into the mist, limbs scraping against dead branches.
"They’re blind," Celeste murmured, barely audible. "But not stupid."
She pointed at one in the distance, a tall figure dressed in ceremonial robes, skin barely hanging onto its face. Its arms were covered in scars that pulsed with necrotic runes.
"Some of the stronger ones can feel mana if it’s unstable. If we cast even a weak spell now, we’d be torn apart."
Albedo glanced at it. The ghoul priest seemed to be standing still, almost in prayer. Its head was bowed, bony fingers laced together, but its body vibrated with a twitchy energy. As if listening to something far, far below the earth.
"Do they remember what they were?" he asked quietly.
Celeste answered with a shrug, "The old ones do. Pieces, at least. That’s why some still wear their old robes or weapons."
"Do they know they’re dead?"
"That’s the tragedy," Lilian whispered beside him, "They know. They just don’t care anymore."
The group kept walking.
At one point, they passed a scene that made them all stop.
A giant tree had grown around something, a creature much larger than the others. A ghoul, but also... not.
It had once been a dire beast, a chimera perhaps. Its multiple heads twitched in unison, bound to the roots of the tree that had fused with its ribs and spine.
Black vines pulsed through its body, pumping some viscous black fluid in place of blood.
It didn’t move. Not fully. But it watched them. With every eye.
Celeste muttered a quiet curse and gestured for them to speed up. Even Ember’s ears twitched at the unnatural presence.
"The Beast-Trees," Celeste explained as they moved faster, "They sprout when a ghoul nests inside a dying magical beast. The mana corruption fuses them together over centuries."
"And they’re... sentient?" Albedo asked.
"Yes. Barely. But they protect the ghouls. They’re like wardens."
Lilian grinned, "If one of them wakes up, it’s game over for us."
"Well let’s make sure none of them wake up,"
Albedo said, and the trio continued on their journey.